The Anti-Intellectualism Demon King’s World Invasion

Chapter 6. The Source of the Spring

If the Dessert Desert has nothing but rocks instead of a Nectar Spring (which wasn’t bad for the jelly life forms), the greatest advantage of Oswald’s desert was the oasis.

The ecosystem around the oasis was extremely abundant. Now it’s full of jellies, but it covered almost half of the desert, about 5 square kilometers.

Oswald, thanks to this blessed terrain, was able to farm, fish, raise livestock, and build a fairly strong army.

“The plants that grow naturally near this oasis, Oswald didn’t create them, did he?”

“No. They were there from the start of the game. The player only slightly altered the ecosystem within the oasis, including the fish. Now it’s all swallowed up by jellies.”

In other words, if the privilege of my world, which has nothing but rock desert, is the Nectar Spring, the privilege of Oswald’s desert world was this abundant oasis itself.

I checked the oasis. It seemed that my jellies hadn’t killed all the life forms in the lake, as the original fish, frogs, aquatic plants, and waterweeds were still surviving among the jellies.

Oswald’s created species couldn’t eat them, though. Why did Oswald create a human-like species instead of an aquatic species that eats water plants and lives in the oasis in such a good world?

I don’t understand. If it were me, I would have created frogmen or hippos to become the rulers of the lake.

To balance this ecosystem, I exercised ‘Divinity’.

〈[Unnamed Fish] evolves into [Jelly-Eater Fish].〉

〈[Unnamed Amphibian] evolves into [Jelly-Eater Frog].〉

“Are you evolving the fish and frogs here too?”

“The freshwater jellies currently have no natural predators. They are the most primitive forms of mud jellies and gravel jellies, without even the ability to protect themselves with sand. Predators are essential to control their numbers and increase the diversity of the ecosystem.”

The subsequent evolution was left alone. Some jellies would gradually harden using sand, and the jelly-eater fish would develop stronger teeth and tougher scales.

The jelly-eater frog would evolve to eat soft and fast jellies, gaining incredible swimming speed and digestive power.

As I explained to the angel earlier, it’s better to eliminate the aquatic plants here. It’s not that I have a grudge against pure plants, but pure plants would be easily adapted by other players. It’s most appropriate to preserve only the original life forms, the jellies.

Using 〈Divinity〉, I inserted the photosynthesis genes of ‘plants’ into the 〈Aquatic Plant Jellies〉 living in the Nectar Oasis to adapt them to freshwater. Now they are 〈True Aquatic Plant Jellies〉.

“So, the original aquatic plant jellies were fake?”

“Biological naming is always like this. Aquatic plant jellies are just jellies with an aquatic plant-like ecology, and these true aquatic plant jellies perform photosynthesis with chlorophyll in addition to their jelly ecology. They are plants and jellies at the same time…”

The true aquatic plant jellies receive sunlight, drink water, and exhale carbon dioxide and magic.

At the same time, they receive sunlight, drink carbon dioxide and water, and exhale oxygen.

As a result, a creature that drinks a lot of water and exhales magic and oxygen is born. The amount of oxygen they increase in the water will greatly help the fish and frogs survive in an ecosystem without aquatic plants.

And carnivorous puddings like [Meat-Eating Pudding], which have nothing to eat right now, will prey on these fish and frogs. The fish, frogs, and puddings will accelerate each other’s evolution, gradually becoming bigger, faster, and more aggressive, ultimately becoming underwater ecosystem destroyers that can overthrow any life form in the water.

“This game is originally about evolving creatures freely, but it’s the first time I’ve seen a player actively use invasive species as a strategy.”

“In an extreme 〈Life〉 build, there’s nothing else to do in the early stages. And anyway, this also has its limits.”

The angel looked at me as if in disbelief.

“This build has limits?”

“At a certain point, the development of civilization through 〈Technology〉 or 〈Mystery〉 surpasses the growth rate of 〈Life〉. A life-centered build is really strong and efficient if you specialize in just one thing, but it’s very difficult to change direction immediately because it’s based on evolving species into stronger ones. I also have no 〈Faith〉, so even though there are many life forms I want to evolve, I’m currently neglecting quite a few.”

Eventually, there will come a time when the jelly army I’ve spread can be destroyed by the civilization’s own capabilities.

Of course, not now. In the next world, maybe even the world after that, I’ll win by destroying the opponent’s ecosystem with the jelly army.

But from the fourth world, it will be a bit difficult, from the fifth world, it will be precarious, and from the sixth world, it will almost certainly be that the civilization of that world can block the invasion of the jelly army with its own capabilities.

In the seventh clash, at roughly an average level of 7, with high levels being 8-9 and even the lowest being 5, any civilization or world will find it difficult to respond to the ecosystem destruction caused by the jelly drop.

Whether they use manpower to clear it all out,

Use magic to remove it,

Develop technology to analyze the structure of the jellies or find a way to remove them,

Or even use divine power to evolve natural predators of the jellies to respond.

“So, you’re not saying you’ll build a magnificent ecosystem and then lose spectacularly in the seventh fight. Are you finally building a civilization?”

Ah. No.

Why are you so obsessed with building a civilization? Winning through ecosystem destruction is not the only strategy. There will be another strategy then.

Anyway, I put a lot of effort into creating a freshwater ecosystem. Removing the aquatic plants and introducing the jelly plants while ensuring the existing life forms didn’t die off was quite a cumbersome task.

At the same time, I had to check the state of the Nectar Oasis, making sure the ecosystems didn’t negatively impact each other, removing the livestock that used to eat the aquatic plants, and slightly modifying the animals and birds that originally inhabited the Oswald Desert so they could eat the jelly plants…

While removing the jelly plants, a strange thought suddenly occurred to me.

“Hey. I just got curious. Where does the water in this Oswald Oasis come from? With the sun blazing down like this, shouldn’t it have dried up? Is it magic?”

“To be precise, we officially use the term ‘mystery’ instead of ‘magic.'”

Ma. Gic.

“Anyway, to answer your question… If you adjust the divine perspective and check underground, you’ll find the answer.”

So I lowered my perspective and looked underground. And I was astonished.

Originally, an oasis is formed when groundwater accumulated over thousands of years of rain in the desert rises to the surface. The mechanism is no different from a ‘spring’ or ‘hot spring,’ just on a different scale.

In Oswald’s world, there was such a massive aquifer.

“Aquifer LV.1: A terrain that stores water resources underground. It stores rain falling from all over the world or water attribute magic. As the world expands, it naturally grows, and if a lot is drawn out, it decreases.”

Wow. Oswald, you really got an amazing terrain. There would have been no worries about water until the end of the game.

“You ended the game in just one round.”

That’s not important. If there’s this much water, it would be good to merge the Nectar Oasis and this Oswald Lake in the long run.

Then a vast wetland would form, with one side of the wetland extremely diluted with freshwater nectar. And the other side would form an ecosystem filled with relatively concentrated nectar.

Let’s see. Should I use the rock jelly creatures to break through the physical barrier of the desert between the two? Build a canal.

“If you raise a civilization, you can do it quickly…”

Ah. But this won’t work. I don’t have ‘faith’ or ‘politics’ right now, so I can’t command the creatures. I’ll just have to wait for the natural expansion to merge the two isolated ecosystems.

“Can’t you just create a race with strong faith and social skills?”

I gained a good insight. Satisfied with this fact, I looked around my small ecosystem. There’s still quite some time until the world collision, so a little more management should do…

But suddenly, I felt a strange sensation.

The Oswald Oasis was actually rising water from an underground aquifer.

Then what principle does the ‘Nectar Spring’ use to produce nectar?

In the game, it leveled up naturally, so I just thought it existed and didn’t pay any attention, but thinking about it, it’s a very unnatural terrain.

I used the function to see through the ground to examine the source of the Nectar Spring.

“Nectar Spring LV4: A terrain that produces nectar. It continuously refines nectar by absorbing the surrounding magic.”

Instead of this superficial explanation, I wanted to know the principle by which this terrain produces nectar, a high-density energy source. If there’s a principle, unlike in the game, maybe I could utilize it?

I concentrated divine power to examine the principle. And the discovered principle was astonishing.

“Nectar Spring LV4: A terrain that produces nectar. It continuously refines nectar by absorbing the surrounding magic.

Detailed explanation: Pure essence containing the energy of life. A terrain that produces nectar. It converts the purest energy in the world, called ‘magic,’ into the energy of ‘life.’ It is a fragment of a being once called a god, and even now, with its body shattered, it produces energy to be supplied to the god’s body.”

“Is this real?”

The angel spoke nonchalantly.

“Yes. It is a fragment of God. Not only nectar, but many mysteries and divinities of the world are like that. The ‘divine’ powers that players possess are all mere imitations of the true God.”

No. That’s not what I meant. I don’t care about the true God or its fragments.

So, in short, this is an organ that operates through a biological mechanism.

I used a technique I never thought of using on the Nectar Spring.

“Wait a minute. Player? What are you doing right now?”

‘Evolution.’

Light burst forth. I felt as if all the divine power I had was being sucked in. The Nectar Spring, greedily absorbing the divinity, soon emitted more light than I had put in.

Flash! And then.

“This is not a suitable target for ‘Evolution’.”

The divinity returned. I was a bit disappointed. The angel babbled from behind as if it was common sense.

“Of course, you can’t. You can’t evolve an organ separated from the main body into a new creature, can you?”

“Plants can be propagated by cuttings.”

“This one can’t.”

I was very disappointed. I thought a great scam build would be possible.

“In that case, you might as well create an intelligent being…”

“Ah? Wait a minute.”

“What is it? You seem to have come up with another gruesome idea.”

What’s gruesome? What’s gruesome.

I recalled a function I thought I would never use throughout the game.

It was a function that could explain strange entities existing in fantasy, aside from biological mechanisms.

The condition for this technique is that the target possesses ‘mystery’ or ‘life’, or something equivalent.

I used the technique again, consuming a large amount of ‘divinity’.

“Using ‘Intelligence Grant’ on ‘Nectar Spring’.”

“Huh?”

Along with the angel’s bewilderment, I felt all the divine power I had being sucked out again.

Wriggle─!

The Nectar Spring began to pulsate in response to the divine power.